


The Resistance

by noveltea



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-17
Updated: 2010-07-17
Packaged: 2017-10-10 15:02:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/101059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noveltea/pseuds/noveltea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It only takes a split-second for the world to change.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

_It only takes a split-second for the world to change._

_One blinding, split-second for everything you know and love to come to a sudden stop, leaving you wondering where you will go from that point, because everything you know and love has become a barren wasteland, littered with the bodies of the dead. Or worse, only their ashes._

_No one knew who it was, or how it happened. A nuclear explosion in the heart of New York was unexpected, and there was no one left alive to say exactly what had happened. It hadn't been a bomb dropped by enemy forces, and so the government hadn't been able to provide the retaliative action that the people demanded, lest they start an unnecessary war._

_The months after the explosion were instead filled with overwhelming support from all over the country, and all over the world. The government worked to stabilise the economy, to rebuild what they could of the once-great city, and try to confirm the numbers of the dead. Leading that charge was the recently elected Congress representative for New York, Nathan Petrelli._

_His family was long ingrained in New York history, and overnight he became the poster-boy for hope and perseverance. His own personal tragedy in the wake of the explosion only served to further ingratiate him into the hearts of the people he represented. In one split-second on an otherwise calm and beautiful day, he lost his wife and two sons._

_It was five months later when it was revealed that the person responsible for the explosion was a serial killer going by the name of Sylar. He had supposedly been killed in the explosion that he created - created with his own body._

_That was when everything turned upside down._

_In one public announcement, the President informed the country - the world - that living among them were people with extraordinary powers. Extraordinarily _dangerous_ powers. They started rounding up those with confirmed superhuman abilities, quietly. People disappeared and after a while it became so common place that no one blinked an eye at the news._

When those with powers fought back for their freedom, the government labeled them terrorists and they no longer kept the arrests quiet. New prisons were built to contain all manner of 'evil' powers that were a risk to all the 'normal' people.

Panic took hold, and families were divided by paranoia. Men, women and children with suspected abilities were reported to the authorities and removed, never to see their loved ones again.

It was the start of a new civil war, that did not seem to have an end.

The fact remained that there was still no scientific explanation for why some people developed abilities, and why others did not. A child who had parents who both carried the genetic makeup for some superhuman ability was likely to develop one themselves. But it wasn't always the case, and a scientific research center was set up to study those who had been locked away.

The lucky ones on the outside changed their names and locations, hiding from the authorities as best they could. Around the country, shadow organisations were set up to aid in the relocation of people possessing an ability, run by other 'special' people, or by other people sympathetic to their plight and appalled at the way they were being treated by a government who had lost sight of who they represented.

The most well-organisation operation running was under the command of a man who now only went by the name of Bennet, and an associate from his past with the unique ability to tap into any electronic signal, acting as a living transmitter and receiver. Together with Hana, Bennet helped to relocate others with special abilities, teaching them how to evade giving away their secret.

Others independently fought back against the government, most failing against superior numbers. Eventually they began to form small resistance groups. Hana drew them together, becoming a central point for a much larger group, an official resistance group. They attacked the prisons containing their people, or the labs where they were being experimented on.

They never attack civilians, or locations where there would a significant civilian casualty rate.

It wasn't the people who continued, day-in-day-out, to persecute them. Their war was with the government.

With the current President's term almost over, and the new Candidates vying for the position in the White House, it was a sure thing that Nathan Petrelli would win the election. His dedication, steadfast hope, and determination had won the hearts and votes of people all over the country.

Until the day he chose to save the life of another, while revealing that he, too, was one of the people with special abilities. In a second, the warrant went out for his arrest and capture, and the only life he had ever known was over.

Like hundreds of others he fled and disappeared, leaving behind a legacy that would not soon be forgotten.

Jeremiah Colt took over the Presidency and continued the hunt for "the dangerous criminals that needed to be locked away for their own safety and the safety of the population as a whole."

All the while, the Resistance continued to grow.


	2. Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> he irony of his current situation was not lost on Nathan as he sat in a corner at the bar, in a roadhouse in a small town in Minnesota.

The irony of his current situation was not lost on Nathan as he sat in a corner at the bar, in a roadhouse in a small town in Minnesota.

Three months ago he had been a sure bet to win the Presidency, and he had gone and messed up any further chance he had by saving that boy's life. That boy who had been willing to end his own life by jumping off a building. But for all his political dreams, he was not a man without a heart - Peter had seen to that, all those years ago - and as much as he had tried to keep his secret, he knew it would have come out eventually. There was just too much paranoia in the wake of the nuclear explosion in New York.

He had saved a life and ended his political career, and life as a free man, in an instant. He had not even hesitated, and that was what scared him the most. That after everything that had happened, the dream he had been chasing was something that he was not looking for anymore.

Draining the rest of his drink, he set the glass back on the bar top and pushed all those thoughts into the darkest recesses of his mind, where he would not think about them until they snuck back to the forefront of his mind. Right now, he was going to have another drink - make that a double - and try and figure out how he was going to find Peter. His little brother had disappeared a few months after the explosion, taking Claire with him. The last thing Peter had told him was that he would make sure Claire was safe.

He had hoped that his brother might have sent a message, just to tell him that they were safe, but there had been nothing. Now, in a situation foreign to him, Nathan was in the interesting position of trying to figure out exactly where his little brother had holed up in. With all the arrests of 'superhuman' individuals, they had all gone to ground.

One memory kept returning to him, and had done so for the last five years - Simone Devreaux in his office telling him to go public about Peter's special abilities; his special ability. Nathan had never been one for using the phrase, "I told you so," finding it condescending and rude, but it was always the first thing that popped into his mind. Everything that he had feared five years ago was a reality, and reality had far surpassed his imagination and it made him sick to his stomach.

The guy behind the bar - young, in his twenties - returned with his drink, silently accepting the money Nathan slapped on the bar top without a word. Nathan was not in the mood to talk, and had learnt to be careful about making eye contact with other people. Congressman Petrelli had been well-known around the country for his "valiant effort after the destruction in New York," and had gained equal fame for outing himself as superhuman on national television. And one could never be too careful; people were turning in family members to the authorities if they suspected they fit the profile, so they were all too happy to turn in a complete stranger.

He supposed he should have been grateful that there was no television in the roadhouse where he had come to stop. He had not expected to stay as long as he had, but distracted by thoughts of the past, and all the painful memories they stirred up, he had started drinking and he was still responsible enough not to drive when he had had too much to drink. Instead he had been content to sit in the corner and watch the room, locals and drifters alike drinking and talking in their own little groups. There was a young couple on the opposite side of the bar whispering to each other, and an older man drinking on his own - just like Nathan - and muttering to himself.

Time moved at different speeds, he noted, depending on the mood of the individual. Tired, and frustrated at the lack of progress he had made in locating Peter, it was moving far too quickly for Nathan's liking, and now it was darker outside, and there were more people in the roadhouse. It was not full, but the noise level had increased and he turned back in to his own world.

The bartenders changed, and a young woman took a seat at the bar on the same side as Nathan, but she did not give him a second look, instead starting up a conversation with the female behind the bar, who looked barely older than the guy who's shift she had taken over. It was when the woman seated at the bar shifted to look up at the clock on the wall above Nathan's head that he saw what she looked like; short brown hair and blue eyes on pale skin. She was young herself, in her mid-twenties, he hesitated a guess, and dressed far nicer than anyone else in the room, in clean jeans and a pristine white top.

He could have sworn he knew her from somewhere.

He must have been staring, because she flashed him a small, amused smile. "New in town, hm?" she asked, amusement threading through her soft voice.

Startled at having been addressed, he did not respond for a second, before sitting up straighter. He had not shaved in a couple of days, and knew he looked a little worse for wear. "That obvious?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "We get a lot of strangers through here," she said, taking a sip of the drink that had been placed in front of her, with a "thank you" to the girl behind the bar. "Did you know that you're staring?"

The off-hand way she said it surprised him. "I'm, um," he stumbled over the words, "Sorry. I don't mean to, it's just... You look familiar." He realised as he said it that it sounded like the world's worst pick up line. But the longer he looked at her, the more he knew that he had seen her somewhere before, but he just could not put his finger on where. "Have we met before?"

Shifting on the bar stool, she shook her head, no. "I don't believe so," she told him, but there was something puzzling about the look that crossed her face. Almost like she recognised him - which had the potential to be a very bad thing - but could not figure it out.

The glass in his hand was empty again, and he caught the bartender's attention and ordered another one; he was not going to be driving anywhere tonight, that much he knew for sure. Ordering another drink for the woman next time him, he was confused when the girl behind the bar looked at him weirdly, and the woman next to him started laughing. She nodded her head once at the girl behind the bar before addressing Nathan again.

"The drink is on the house," she told him, the same amused smile gracing her face. There was a wicked gleam in her eyes, the kind where one knew something the other person did not.

He put two-and-two together. "You work here?"

"Close," she said, still smiling. "I own the place. Today's my day off."

"And you're still here?"

"I think you'll find there's not much to do in this little town," she told him, and he realised that her accent was familiar. She had spent time in upstate New York.

Their fresh drinks arrived, and Nathan thanked her, about to ask how long she had lived in Minnesota for when the girl behind the bar - Tess - returned with the phone. A brief exchange, and his drinking partner took her leave and disappeared out the back, talking quietly into the phone.

Two hours later he was still sitting at the bar, despite a brief respite to retrieve his jacket from the beat-up ute he had purchased the previous month to 'blend in.' The roadhouse was slowly emptying of customers, but Nathan felt compelled to stay. The woman who looked so familiar to him had not returned, but that only gave him opportunity to think about it, turning her image over and over in his mind.

There was also the matter of attraction that he shoved out of his mind; she had to be half his age, and he had been on his own for five years and unable to form any manner of meaningful relationship while in the public eye. He was only human, and she was attractive.

He ordered another plate of food, surprised at the quality given that it was ordered in a roadhouse. Not that he had ever spent much time visiting roadhouses in his past; for all he knew it was typical of such places. When the woman returned to the bar she was clearly surprised to see him still sitting in the same place.

"Still here, huh?"

Nathan shrugged his shoulders once, as she joined him at the bar again. He asked her the question he had not had the chance to ask her earlier, and found out that she had grown up in upstate New York, that she bought the bar from a friend of hers who had decided that the stationary life was not for her and gone on a road trip with two friends of hers, and that her name was Sam. During the course of their conversation, she sent Tess home and started cleaning up behind the bar.

He had stopped drinking while he ate, and now nursed a glass of cold water, as he caught sight of the time. How he spent the entire night sitting at a bar was beyond him, but for the first time since he had gone into 'hiding,' and for a long time before that, he felt like a normal person. No obligations, other than his own personal welfare, and he could go in any direction he decided.

Then he felt guilty for thinking that way. He had lost his wife, a woman whom he had loved more than anything else in the world, and his two boys. The feelings he felt at their loss, even years later, was palpable, and he knew that they would not lessen anytime soon.

His mood dampened, he left his seat and moved around the now empty roadhouse. He was reluctant to leave, and Sam had not made any mention to him that she wanted him to leave. She went about her business while he wandered aimlessly, unaware that she watched him curiously out of the corner of her eye. The jukebox in the corner had fallen silent earlier, but now he pushed in a couple of quarters from his pocket and punched in a song number. His mood had turned morbid, and he heard the familiar music of Kissing a Fool - the song that Heidi had dubbed theirs - start.

Behind the bar, Sam was restocking the glasses. When he motioned for her to join him in the middle of the room, she hesitated, and he wondered if she would kick him out now. Instead, she joined him - surprising him, and herself he though - and let him lead her around the floor. Her hands were cool in his own warm ones.

They danced the entire song, swaying in time to the music, and he felt the familiar warmth of another body close to his own. He had to focus his thoughts on things other than her body, and the way she smelled of lavender. The song ended all too quickly, and she started to pull away. Gently, Nathan held on to one of her hands, and she would not meet his eyes.

She cleared her throat, and he wondered if it was nervousness. "Not many people who pass through here appreciate the classics," she said.

"One more dance?" He was almost ashamed that he could not quite keep the pleading out of his voice.

Her eyes still did not meet his. "You're married," she told him softly, and he cursed her observance. He still wore his wedding band.

He hesitated a moment, trying to choose the wisest response. He was not sure what he wanted, in all honesty, but he did not want the wrong response to shut off any possibility.

"My wife..." The words caught in his throat and he stopped. Clearly his throat, he tried again. "She died."

The harsh reality that those words dealt him was what he deserved, he had decided after the explosion - he should have been able to stop the explosion; he had known it was going to happen, and he should have been able to prevent it. Instead he had done nothing, and payed the ultimate price for it.

Some of the tension he had not realised she had been carrying in her face faded away, replaced by a sympathetic sadness. "I'm sorry," she said softly, and she sounded like she meant it. She did not stop him when Nathan pulled her back around as another song started to play. He pressed his luck and pulled her closer.

When she rested her head against his chest he wondered if there was something more to Sam than just being a nice roadhouse owner humouring an older, miserable man.

His fingers played over her left hand, tracing the ring that she wore. "What would your fiancé say?" he asked, not sure if he really wanted an answer. He had seen the ring earlier, beautiful in its simplicity, a plain silver band with a blue stone the same colour as her eyes. In his arms, he felt her tense.

Looking up at him, she saw his own pain mirrored in her eyes. "Sometimes we do things to protect the ones we love," she said, voice barely above a whisper. Unbidden, she added, "I'd do anything to be with Tony now, but I can't. Things aren't that simple anymore."

That was when she let go, moving away from Nathan. "I don't even know you're name," she said, once she was safely back behind the bar. "Normally I'm much better at remembering to get the little details."

He was practiced at this now, and did not hesitate, or flinch when giving a name that was not his. "Thomas," he told her, before correcting, "Tom."

She watched him for a moment, features creased as she thought about that, as if sizing him up. "You don't look like a Tom, or a Thomas," she told him. He could see that she did not think the name fit, but she waved it off. "Never mind. Where are you staying in town, Tom?"

He stuck his hands into the pockets of his jeans - and this was a new thing for him; he had not worn jeans since his teenage years. Even on the weekends he had always been dressed nicely, with no jeans in sight. Now he was wearing jeans, sneakers and a t-shirt, of all things. If his mother could see him now she would have taken one look at him and given him a lecture on public image. As much as he loved her, she was a demanding woman and scary, too, when she wanted to be. Even her grown-up sons were wary of her, and that was just on the good days. But now he was in hiding, and wearing casual clothes, and caught between whether it was appropriate to flirt with a woman at a bar or not.

His pause between answering her and opening his mouth to say something was apparently all the answer she needed. "Right. So, nowhere, huh? Well, if you need a place to stay the night you can stay here." She caught one look at the expression on his face and added, "In the spare bedroom out the back."

"Do you always invite strange men you don't know to stay over?"

She did not even blink. "All the time." She finished packing up the bar and checked the lock on the door. "Look, I'm not defenseless, if that's what you're implying. And occasionally we get people coming through here who get caught up for one reason or another who need a roof over their heads for one night. If I thought you were a mass murdering psychopath you wouldn't still be here. Do you need the room, or not?"

He did blink, finding her bluntness almost funny. "But how do you know that I'm not a mass-murdering psychopath?"

"I'm an excellent judge of character." The shadow that crossed her face, hardening her eyes, made him think there was another reason. He also suspected she would not give him that reason, even if he asked. Instead, he managed a graceful, "Thank you."

Nodding her head once, Sam motioned for him to follow her to the back of the roadhouse, which connected to a small apartment. Her home, apparently. It was about as different from the interior of the roadhouse as he could imagine. Where the bar had been rough and worn-in, the apartment was modern and comfortable and warm. It had been done up recently, from the smell of fresh paint.

She stopped suddenly, and only well-honed observance stopped Nathan from walking into her back. She had not expected him to be standing so close when she turned around and her breath hitched, and there was - for a second - a longing in her eyes. She turned around again and pointed out the spare bedroom. "I'm up early, so don't be surprised if you're woken up by noises outside the room," she warned.

"You really let strangers sleep here all the time?" He could not believe that any sensible young woman would do that, and still feel safe.

"Yeah, I do," she said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. "Of course, they're a certain type of stranger, usually."

"Oh?"

"I haven't made my mind up about you yet, Tom," she added, and it answered his unasked question. "You're something of a mystery, I daresay."

Nathan raised an eyebrow. "How so?"

Frowning slightly, she looked him over again. "For one, you think you know me from somewhere, and I do think you look familiar, but I can't place you from anywhere in my past. Second of all, you wear the clothes of a drifter, but you don't look comfortable in what you're wearing." She tugged at the edges of his jacket, and he shifted uncomfortably. "Third, you're running from something, but I can't tell if it's your past or yourself who you're trying to escape."

His mouth was dry, but he managed a reply. "Actually, I'm looking for someone."

Her eyes asked the silent question: Who?

"My brother," he told her, seeing no reason not to. "I lost track of him, and now I need to find him."

From behind dark eyelashes she watched him curiously, assessing him based on a scorecard he could not see. Finally she nodded her head. Reiterating where the spare bedroom was, she also pointed out the bathroom and the kitchen. Finally, she turned and said, "Good night, Tom."

"Sam."

She had started to move away, towards her own room, when his voice stopped her. Curious, she turned around and waited for him to continue. It was not words that followed, but a kiss that caught her off-guard and made her reach out to him to steady herself; one of his own slipped around her waist and pulled her closer. He had not expected her to return the kiss, but she did, and she tasted like peppermint. She pulled away first, and they were both breathing heavily, but she still held on to him as though afraid her knees would give way beneath her. It took her a moment to catch her breath and fought his own arousal.

When she disentangled their limbs gracefully, he knew he had his answer, though he knew it was propriety rather than non-interest on her part. If she had not have been interested she would not have kissed him back; not like that. Before moving away, she kissed his cheek, a mere whisper of what had just transpired.

"Good night." She walked away and did not look back.

It took sleep a long time to overtake Nathan.


	3. Part 2

When Nathan woke the following morning, well after the sun started to peek through the blinds, his host was nowhere to be seen. The apartment itself was quiet and strangely comforting, if a little alien, and a preferable environment to his car after a night of drinking.

He found the note on the kitchen table next to a pitcher of freshly made orange juice and a load of bread.

_Out on errands. Help yourself to breakfast. If you need to head out, just close the door on your way out (it automatically locks); if not, I'll be back later.  
-Sam_

Just like everything else about this small, out of the way roadhouse, the note was strange. In a few hours Sam had pulled out why he was on the road and assessed his character, while all he had gleamed was that she had picked up the roadhouse from a friend and that she'd once lived in New York. Whoever she was, she was good at keeping things to herself.

And awfully trusting of a complete stranger.

As he poured himself a glass of orange juice and sat down at the table to read the newspaper, he wondered if that trust was purely bred of living in a small town, or some other purpose.

 

*

 

The errands that had taken Sam out of the apartment were the result of the stranger she'd taken in for the night. Still reeling from the kiss, not wholly unexpected given Tom's (if that was even his real name) behaviour, she had to adjust her day's plan in the early hours of the morning, changing her meeting place from the roadhouse to a local bakery and cafe that she frequented.

What irritated her was that she couldn't get her mind to focus on anything other than Tom. He was attractive, intelligent, charming - despite a penchant for drinking while miserable - and old enough, she suspected, to be her father. Almost. She had not been looking for another romantic entanglement, and while she doubted he was looking for that, she intended to steer well clear of that eventuality.

Part of her hoped that by the time she returned home, he would be long gone.

A fresh cup of tea was placed in front of her and she thanked Belinda quietly, while reviewing the latest reports from the roadhouse. It might only be a small town, but in the three years she had owned the business, she had been able to live comfortably in relative solitude.

That solitude had proved useful for a number of reasons, one of which sat down opposite her in the bakery overlooking the lake. Brown curls framed a distractingly pretty face that belied the danger that Hana Gitelman possessed. In the three years she had known the woman, Sam had never met anyone who could appear and disappear as silently as Hana.

Looking up over the edge of the reports, Sam offered her a practiced smile, "Morning."

The former Israeli intelligence officer inclined her head by way of greeting and raised an eyebrow. "A change of location?"

Sam shrugged and looked out across the lake. She'd chosen a table outside, where it was less likely for someone to accidentally overhear their conversation. "I have a," she searched for the right word before settling for, "house guest."

It earned another raised eyebrow and what might have been a crooked smile. Hana had always been good at keeping emotion off her face, which Sam found, in turns, both frustrating and fascinating. What she knew of the woman had been purely information that Bennet had divulged into order to justify Hana's credentials when they had first met.

"Is it going to be a problem?"

Sam shook her head, no. "They'll be gone by the time anyone needs the room," she added. She was already running plausible excuses for kicking someone out when her companion spoke again.

"Are 'they' one of us?" One of us, meaning special. Superhuman, or whatever it was that the authorities called them these days.

Shrugged her shoulders, Sam couldn't give her a definitive answer, because she wasn't sure. "Possibly," she added. "He's hiding something, but that doesn't mean he's one of us. And it's a little difficult walking up to a stranger and asking them if they have a superhuman ability. It's like putting up a billboard for the authorities saying, 'here I am, come and take me away.'"

The corner of Hana's lip twitched, and Sam added one point next to her name. "More so than having a stranger stay in one's home?"

"He's harmless," Sam reaffirmed, pushing all thoughts of the kiss and the feelings that it had elicited, putting it down to it being far too long since she'd been kissed like that. Instead, she refocused on the issue at hand. "Do you need the room?"

Hana shook her head once. "Not yet. But maybe soon. They're becoming more aggressive in their search for us. We had to move our base of operations," she said, voice low and soft.

Sam knew better to ask where they had moved to. In the time she had known Hana and Bennet, she'd never been to the base that they established; where they handed out new identities and lives, where they relocated people who needed to hide. People like themselves.

When she'd first been outed as one of the dangerous people with superhuman abilities, she'd lost the man she was going to marry, a job that she loved, and a life that she could only dream about now. Somehow they found her, contacted her. The ink was barely dry on the contract she'd signed with Jo, buying the roadhouse, when she'd been recruited into the group that Hana only ever referred to as the Resistance. Hana was her usual contact, and they used the roadhouse to keep people like themselves safe while their new papers came through, and while the relocation was arranged.

Sam's place was only one of many they had built around the country, masquerading as common businesses in small towns, almost unnoticeable, and very good hiding places. She could remember the name of every person who'd stayed with her - their original names - and who they had once been. She kept in contact with only a handful, and only when they passed through town. Their profile was well-known, and she'd never known them to stay in one location for more than a few weeks.

Hana had pointed out once that her position was unique and ideal; her own business, a power she could control easily but was good for defense, and common sense.

In her old life she'd been a police officer, barely out of training, but one of the brightest young recruits. That was a memory of the past. She'd worked in D.C., and had been good with people, and was one of the few young officers who was often delegated liaison duties with other agencies. She'd developed an understanding of how they worked, and she knew a cop a mile away.

Hana's voice drew her back, and she looked her companion in the eye. "There's something else."

"Good news or bad news?" Her voice was light, but her throat was dry, and the look in Hana's eyes said it all. "Right, so much for optimism. What is it?"

"We've started tracking an old friend, once more."

The words 'old friend' sent a chill down Sam's spine. There were few things that Hana and Bennet kept her apprised of on a general basis, mostly because she did shelter people in hiding and she needed to know. 'Old friend' was not taken so literally, because Sam had never met the person in question, but the whole world knew who he was. The whole world thought he was dead.

"Gray?" Hana nodded, and Sam cursed under her breath. The exploding man.

Hana slid an ordinary letter-sized envelope across the table top. Inside it held a single newspaper article. "A murder was reported in Seattle three days ago, the same profile as before."

"Jesus." Her voice was a whisper as she skimmed the article with only hinted at the brutality that she knew was actual fact. "where is he now?"

Hana shook her head once. "We're not sure. We lost him in Texas. Our ability to track him full-time is limited, particularly since the relocation. I'll keep you informed."

Nodding her head, Sam slipped the envelope between her reports and shut the folder. Her tea had cooled in outside air, and was only lukewarm when she started drinking it. The street was starting to hum with human activity. When she turned back to face Hana she was already gone, and Sam shook her head.

"Nice to see you, too," she mumbled, leaving her payment on the table and waving to Belinda behind the counter as she grabbed her things and headed back to the roadhouse. It was bad enough that the authorities were becoming more and more aggressive; the last thing they needed was for Sylar to resurface.

 

*

 

When she slipped inside the entrance to the roadhouse, she noticed the peaceful quiet in the bar. Jack wouldn't be in to open up and man the bar for another half-hour, which meant a half-hour of peace and quiet. Then they'd get the late-workers, the late-to-work-ers, and the people who'd traveled all night. The brilliant thing about being the boss, she'd discovered, was that she could officially get other people to handle things that she wanted nothing to do with.

Grabbing a bottle of soda water out of the fridge, she walked through the office, and back into her apartment where she heard the shower running. The smell of toast lingered in the kitchen where she left her folders sitting on the bench. The room was clean; the pitcher of juice placed in the fridge, dishes washed, and toaster put away.

At least he was house trained.

The sound of the shower stopped, but she barely paid any attention to it as she left the soda water in the fridge, and shuffled through the folders to the one that contained the article that Hana had given her.

She left the kitchen as Tom walked out in only a towel; to his credit, even in his shock, he remained completely composed. "I'm sorry, I hope you don't mind that I used the shower," he said, regaining the ability to speak before she did.

"No, uh, that's... fine. Yes." She blinked and mentally berated herself for acting like a teenage girl who'd just seen the cutest guy in school without his shirt. She held up one finger, and said, "I'll be right back," practically running into her bedroom, and most definitely not looking back. Once in the relative safety of the room, she hit her forehead with her palm.

"Idiot."


	4. Part 3

The rest of the day passed uneventfully, and for the first time in a long time Sam sat down to lunch with a perfect stranger and enjoyed the experience. It wasn't often she was graced with a guest who could hold up their end of an intelligent conversation on current topics. It was perhaps one of the things that she missed most since she had hidden away in the small town in Minnesota.

It had been pleasant and surprisingly comfortable given their last few encounters, and the only awkward moment was when Tom asked if he could possibly impose on her hospitality for one more night. Despite her conversation with Hana, she really couldn't come up with a plausible reason for saying 'no,' because despite the strange and unexpected attraction she felt towards Tom, he was actually one of her better house guests, and was polite on top of all of that.

One day her intuition would fail her, but right then all she'd been able to do was pause, nod her head finally and tell him that that was fine. Of course, she'd added that she still had work to do and he'd have to fend for himself that night while she overtook the lounge room to work on the paperwork.

When lunch ended, she spent the afternoon working in the bar, relieving her hired help. When Jo had run the roadhouse, she had only had one casual worker, a local girl who had since moved on the bigger and brighter pastures. Since then, Sam had hired a number of locals to work shifts, and leave the day-to-day bar tending to them, while she kept the paperwork up to date, and mixed with the locals. It served a number of purposes, most of which built her reputation and popularity with the locals. She was one of the family, an adopted daughter of a close-knit community.

Tom kept to the apartment for most of the afternoon, and she suspected he spent the time on the computer looking for clues about his brothers whereabouts. She hadn't asked him for any more information on that, but she had told him to use the computer if it would help.

After an afternoon catching up with the locals, hearing the latest stories (and a number of old, but good, tales), the office beckoned and she spent time organising the office, filing away documents and piling up the documents she needed to update and check. The pile was larger than she would have liked to have in front of her, but it couldn't be helped. It looked even more daunting sitting on her coffee table, but the comfortable lounge chairs would make it a little more tolerable.

Somewhere, she reasoned, there was a fair medium.

Belinda had dinner sent in for her after seven, and Sam wondered if this routine was a bad thing to get used to. Monday nights were office nights, which meant a dinner from the roadhouse cook, and copious amounts of tea while curled up on the couch.

Tom reappeared sometime after she'd finished dinner, beer bottle still in hand as he settled on the second couch and watched her work. It wasn't the first time she'd had someone watch her while she worked; she had vivid memories of senior officers in D.C. watching her like a hawk, eager to point out any flaws in the junior officer's work. They'd been sorely disappointed, and if Tom was expecting anything out of her, he was sure to experience the same feeling that had.

"Why is it that this is your house, but not your home?" His question was unexpected, and cut through the silence sharply. Not only was the question unexpected, but it was strange, and it made her look up at him.

"What do you mean?"

Tom waved his hand around to encompass the whole room. "The house is comfortable - and don't get me wrong, it's fantastic - but that's all it is. You don't have photos, personal belongings, anything that tells anyone anything about you. It's like you have a shield up, a screen that people can't see through."

She set the papers down on her lap and frowned, mostly in puzzlement. She should have been angry at his observation, insulted, but he was speaking the truth. And it had been deliberate on her part, but no one ever picked up on it, or let her know that they had noticed. It was... unsettling.

"I wanted a fresh start," she told him, and it was most mostly true. Except for the 'wanting' a fresh start. That part was more lie than true. The fresh start had been necessary and hardly by choice, but what could she have done. The only other alternative had been imprisonment and almost certain death, and that was just unacceptable.

"But no memories?"

This time she didn't look at him when she replied. "Sometimes memories are painful."

"so you would run from them? Lock them away because they hurt?" He didn't sound convinced.

She didn't half-blame him; she wouldn't have been convinced either. "Look, I don't expect you, or anyone else, to understand my reasons for the way I live. I do keep my memories - they're all I have left of my old life. Everyone runs away from something for reasons that only they know."

Tom sat forward and rubbed a hand over his jaw, watching her intently. "What are your reasons?"

"You sound like a lawyer," she said, letting out a sigh. "I loved someone," she told him. "More than anything. But something happened and I had a choice to make. To lose him by my own choice, or by theirs. I prefer to have things on my terms, and he might hate me now for leaving, but at least he won't hate me for the reasons they would have given him."

At least he had the decency to look partially guilty for dredging up her old memories, although she was almost positive Tom would have asked more if he thought she would say anything else on the subject. Instead, he offered her an, "I'm sorry," that was quiet and respectful. Her answer, while vague and not offering specifics, was true.

"It was a while back," she told him, voice too flippant. She shoved the papers in her lap back onto the table and unfolded her legs and let them rest on the floor. "What's done is done. And things aren't so bad here. After spending so much time in big cities, who would have ever thought that I'd find some measure peace in the middle of nowhere?" She looked up. "What about you? What are you running from?"

This time it was Tom who looked away, and she felt a pang of regret for asking the question. He'd already told her that his wife was dead, and that no doubt had something to do with it, and she knew it wasn't any of her business. But he'd asked a personal question, and she couldn't help but retaliate with one of her own.

The look in his eyes, she recognised it; almost as though she recognised him as someone she knew, or had at least seen before.

"My wife died in the explosion in New York," he said, after a minute's hesitation. Unlike the previous evening, his voice didn't catch in his throat as much, as though he'd recovered himself enough to say such an obviously painful sentence out loud without stumbling.

Sam swallowed the lump that formed in her throat. "I'm sorry."

He sank back into the couch and stared off to a point that she couldn't see. "We had two children. Two boys."

Her heart broke and the guilt at dredging up those memories was almost overwhelming. "Look, Tom... I'm sorry. You don't have to tell me."

When he looked back over at her, his brown eyes were haunted with the ghosts of his wife and children and the tension in the room was thick enough to smother the entire population of the town. "I never really talked about it with anyone," he said after another moment, and Sam reached over and squeezed one of his hands in her own.

"What about your brother?"

"He was nowhere near New York," Tom told her.

She started to shake her head, "That's not what I meant."

"I know what you meant. He left New York before the explosion, and I haven't heard from him since. We left things on bad terms. I want to try and set things right." He sighed, the sound of a man who felt the weight of his actions and they weighed heavily on his conscience. "I should have done it a long time ago."

Sam squeezed his hand once more. His hand was warmth, and his grip was only half-hearted. "Well, if you'll forgive the cliche, it's always better late than never. Family is important."

Tom nodded his head once, before he stood up slowly, stretching out his body out after having sat down for an extended period of time. She kept her eyes on her hands and off of him. He moved around behind her couch and let one hand rest on her shoulders, the warmth moving from it to her shoulders and she almost leaned back into the touch, but she stopped herself in time.

"Goodnight," he told her, and as he lifted his hand, and she hated the way it made her feel, as much as she liked it.

"Goodnight."

She heard him move away, and the sound of the bedroom door opening - that damn creak that she still had on her list of things to fix. It took longer than she expected for the door to close.

From the doorway, she heard him speak. "Hey. Sam."

She twisted in her seat, looking over her shoulder to where he stood. "Yeah?"

"Thanks."

The corners of her lips twitched up in a smile. "You're welcome."

He nodded, and she let her eyes linger a fraction too long on his. She recognised the look; she was pretty sure it was reflected in her own. But longing and loss were bad things to base any kind of relationship on. And he would be gone in the morning; he _had_ to be gone in the morning.

When the door closed, she slumped back into her chair and listened to the silence.

 

*

 

Once upon a time, she could have slept through anything; now the sound of her phone beeping, signaling a message in her inbox, woke her in a heartbeat. Eyes bleary, Sam was already out of bed before she finished reading the message and cursing the bad timing.

'Sandra' was on her way, and she needed a place to stay.

It had been nearly a year since she'd last seen Sandra, or whichever name the girl was going by now, and had not expected to see her again for a good while. Even though the caller id on her phone had identified the sender of the message, she wasn't going to believe it straight away. For Sandra to appear out of the blue meant she was in trouble, or that there was a trap being laid. Neither was good news, for either of them. Add that to her 'house guest' and things were about to get messy.

Lifting the corner of the mattress up, she pulled out the SIG P239 that she kept hidden there. While she had her own special brand of weapon, old habits died hard, and after years of training, the gun was a comfortable back-up plan if things weren't what they seemed.

Pulling a light satin dressing gown over the top of her nightdress, she left her room quietly and paused in the living room listening for any sound from Tom's room. The last thing she needed was for him to be awake right now.

After a minute she was satisfied, and moved back through the roadhouse office and into the bar proper, bare feet silent on the concrete floors. The only light came from outside, through the slits in the windows, and from the crack beneath the door. Holding the gun in her left hand, she waited.

She wasn't waiting long. The frantic knocking on the wooden door cut sharply through the silence, and echoed in the dark room. She slipped the gun into the pocket of the dressing gown and she made her way, silently, to the door, approaching from the side, keeping her back to the wall. She knocked twice on the door, from the inside, and the person outside the door - Sandra, or whoever it was - stopped banging.

Her heart was beating, and she prayed, to whichever deity that was listening, that all this was just an innocent last-night call for shelter. She let her right hand rest on the doorknob, and felt the familiar tingle course down her left arm as she activated her ability. In the palm of her hand she felt the rod form and pulse with energy and a pale blue light.

Turning the doorknob, she pulled the door open and peered around the side, using the light from the weapon in her hand to see her visitor. She breathed a sigh of relief, and let her hand rest by her side as Sandra stepped inside, and wrapped her arms around Sam.

"My god, Sandra," Sam breathed, wrapping her free arm around her younger friend, "What are you doing here?"

Sandra buried her head into her shoulder, and Sam sighed again. "We didn't know where else to go."

Sam looked up sharply, checking the doorway for whoever Sandra might have been referring to, but it was clear. Pulling away from the brunette girl, she pushed the door closed and raised the rod again.

"Sam, what are you doing?" Sandra sounded confused, and she was looking around the room, as though searching for something. Or someone.

Sam held up a finger to silence the girl. She focused, and the light in her hand faded, as though it had never been there, while she moved around the bar.

"I have rules here," she said, voice raised. Sandra was trailing behind her. Sam knew exactly who had arrived with Sandra, and as much as she was for helping those in need, being woken in the middle of the night by these two was pushing it. Trouble followed them around, and the last thing she wanted was to be caught in the middle of it.

"I swear to God, Peter, if you're here and invisible, I am going to kick your ass."

She felt something behind her shift, and she spun on her heels and came face-to-face with Peter Petrelli - the almost poster child of the superhuman population. The look on his face wasn't quite smug (he couldn't do smug, she decided a while back), but it was close enough and she hit him with a right hook without hesitating. He staggered backward under the blow, but she knew that already the pain in his face would be fading, so regret went out the window.

"What have I told you about sneaking up on me?" Her voice was low and frustrated, and Peter's face had regained the dark expression she was used to seeing on it. Behind her Sandra moved to see if he was alright, stopping only when he raised a hand to tell her he was fine.

Holding both hands up in front of himself, Peter apologised. "Sorry, Sam. I was just being careful. You know that." He reached out and squeezed her shoulder. "Sorry about waking you up, too."

"We just need a place to stay tonight," Sandra told her, voice soft. "We'll be gone by morning. I promise."

Sam was about to reply when the lights suddenly flickered to life and she cursed under her breath; Tom stood in the entrance to the office, beside the bar, staring at the scene before him. She felt ridiculous standing next to two fully dressed people while she was barefoot and in a satin nightdress and gown in the middle of a run-down old bar. But it didn't quite match the frustration that threatened to slip free of her control.

"Is everything okay?" Tom had started to step into the room when he stopped suddenly, and gaped. "Oh my God. _Peter_?"

Both Sandra and Peter stared at the intruder with wide eyes and looks of shock on their faces. "Nathan?"

Sam shook her head. "You people know each other? I thought your name was Tom?" She had rounded on 'Tom' or Nathan, or whoever the hell he was, when it suddenly hit her; the reason why 'Tom' had seemed so familiar, and a sick feeling settled in her stomach. Peter had called him _Nathan_. Nathan Petrelli, the freshman Congressman who'd tried to bring hope back into the world after the nuclear explosion in New York.

She watched in stunned silence, feeling stupid that she had not recognised one of the most influential men in politics in the last four decades. She should have known; it had all been there, all the pieces.

Peter crossed the floor and embraced his older brother. Everyone in the room was in shock, but Sam knew she was the only one who felt sick. Even Sandra's eyes had lit up, just a little, at the sight of Nathan Petrelli, and moved towards the brothers. Sam found herself turning around and leaning against the bar, stomach first.

Her elbows resting on the surface, she dropped her head into her hands and mumbled, "I need a drink."

She had a feeling it was going to be a very long night.


End file.
